THE INTERAgency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) plays a vital role in the country’s fight against Covid-19, Malacañang said on Thursday.
Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque made this remark after Senator Joel Villanueva called for the abolition of the IATF as it has stopped being effective for "quite a long time."
Roque disagreed with Villanueva’s statement, comparing the IATF-EID to a “conductor” that directed the entire performance of both national and local governments.
“Kung wala pong IATF, wala po tayong naging desisyon pagbili po sa bakuna para sa buong bansa, wala po tayong nagkaroon na alert level system, ng mga quarantine classification, at napakahirap po kasi gawin ‘yan kung walang kumukumpas. Ang papel lang naman po ng IATF ay tagakumpas (If there was no IATF, we would not have a decision on the purchase of vaccines for the entire country, we would not have an alert level system, quarantine classifications, and it would be difficult to do that without a conductor. The role of the IATF is that of a conductor),” he said in a Palace press briefing.
Villanueva suggested passing the IATF’s job to local government units (LGUs) since they were “doing better” than the national government at handling the health crisis.
Roque acknowledged the part played by LGUs in responding to the Covid-19 but reminded the lawmaker that the IATF-EID was a policy approach that was adopted by the Duterte administration from the previous administration under President Benigno Aquino III.
“Sa tingin ko po tama po na nagkaroon tayo ng IATF at uulitin ko po, ang IATF naman po, ‘yan naman po ay binuo sa pamamagitan ng isang executive order sa naunang gobyerno at hindi po sa gobyerno ni President Duterte (I think it’s only right that we have an IATF and let me reiterate, the IATF was created through an executive order from the previous government and not the administration of President Duterte),” he added.
While the IATF-EID has had its own share of shortcomings, Roque said it has succeeded in keeping the country’s case-fatality rate low.
“We do not claim to have been perfect, but certainly let’s give due recognition where it is due dahil nakikita naman po natin naiiwasan ang mas marami pa sana mga taong namatay kung hindi po tayo nag implement ng mga measures na binuo po ng ating IATF (because we might not have been able to prevent more deaths if not for the measures implemented and drafted by the IATF),” he said.
Roque said the Philippines currently ranks 105th place in the world ranking for Covid-19 deaths with 38,164 deaths, which is equivalent to a 1.51 percent case fatality rate as of Sept. 29.
The Philippines has also recorded a total of 2.5 million total Covid-19 cases and 2.3 million recoveries, equivalent to a 93.3 percent recovery rate.
“Alam ko po tumaas ngayon dahil sa Delta variant pero ang titignan po natin talaga yung pinaka importante ilan ang namatay at sa ngayon po talaga naman po mas mababa ang mga namamatay kung ikukumpara natin sa buong mundo at 1.5 percent na case fatality rate (I know it increased because of the Delta variant but if we look at it, what is most important is the number of deaths and we really have fewer deaths compared to the 1.5 percent case fatality rate),” he added.
The IATF-EID was created through Aquino’s Executive Order No. 168 to establish a system to identify and assist Filipinos infected with emerging infectious diseases (EID) and prevent the entry of emerging infectious diseases patients into the country.
It is also in charge of preventing the spread of EID in the country by screening possible EID patients, contact tracing, identification of the mode of exposure to the virus, and implementation of effective quarantine and proper isolation procedures and preventing mortality through effective clinical management among other functions. (Azer Parrocha)
